Something from the section on the the Lord's Prayer. There is really good stuff there. Well, all of it is really good. So good I can only read a few pages at a time, as I said before.
The Sixth Petition
Both bread and the forgiveness of sins shed light on the final petition: "Lead us not into temptation" (Luke 11:4). The Father who gives all good gifts allowed even His Son to be tempted by Satan in the wilderness, and that temptation went so far as to include the suggestion to put (physical, earthly) bread ahead of the Word of God and to seek worldly glory instead of properly worshiping God alone (Luke 4:1-13). Jesus will also speak of Satan's desire to "to sift you [the disciples] as wheat" (Luke 22:31). Trials and sufferings come because of the preaching of the kingdom. The disciples will be rejected as Jesus was rejected. This opposition is a given with the coming of the kingdom. To pray not to be led into temptation is to pray for the resources necessary to avoid succumbing to that temptation. The disciples are to pray that though they are assailed by the devil, the world, and the sinful nature, God would preserve them from falling into apostasy. Taken together, the petitions for bread, for forgiveness, and for keeping them from succumbing to temptation are petitions to help the disciples be kept in the one true, saving faith so that they "may finally overcome them and win the victory."
This one hit me because I was talking with someone about Satan. He is such an outmoded concept, but I think of him quite a bit. He is out to get me. This is not paranoia. He wants to live in my brain. I know him. He wants my soul. He wants my confidence in my Lord. Ha, he can't have it. (Trotz dem alten Drachen. Trotz dem Todesrachen. Trotz der Furcht dazu.)
A good petition. This sixth one.
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